300 advanced frequency based words

300 Advanced Frequency-based Words in Motivating
Contexts
Study online at quizlet.com/_1ydec5
1.

document

(v) record for evidence, substantiate
E.g. Document the moments you feel most in love with yourself - what you're wearing, who you're around, what you're
doing. Recreate and repeat.
(Warsan Shire)

2.

comprehensive

(adj.) including much, extensive
E.g. A man, to be greatly good, must imagine intensely and comprehensively; he must put himself in the place of
another and of many others; the pains and pleasures of his species must become his own.
(Percy Bysshe Shelley)

3.

calculated

(adj.) deliberate, planned
E.g. Often the difference between a successful person and a failure is not one has better abilities or ideas, but the
courage that one has to bet on one's ideas, to take a calculated risk - and to act.
(Maxwell Maltz)

4.

consensus

(n.) agreement
E.g. To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is
something in which no one believes and to which no one objects.
(Margaret Thatcher)

5.

resolve

(n.) determination, firmness of purpose
E.g. Each of us has the right and the responsibility to assess the roads which lie ahead, and those over which we
have traveled, and if the future road looms ominous or unpromising, and the roads back uninviting, then we need to
gather our resolve and, carrying only the necessary baggage, step off that road into another direction. If the new
choice is also unpalatable, without embarrassment, we must be ready to change that as well.
(Maya Angelou)

6.

doctrine

(n.) philosophy, school of thought, belief
E.g. The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.
(H.L. Mencken)

7.

provincial

adj. limited in outlook to one's own small corner of the world; narrow-minded
E.g. Man is always inclined to regard the small circle in which he lives as the center of the world and to make his
particular, private life the standard of the universe. But he must give up this vain pretense, this petty provincial way of
thinking and judging.
(Ernst Cassirer)

8.

inherent

(adj.) inborn
E.g. Shyness is the fear of social disapproval or humiliation, while introversion is a preference for environments that
are not overstimulating. Shyness is inherently painful; introversion is not.
(Susan Cain)

9.

gravity

(n.) severity; seriousness; solemnity
E.g. I suppose I'll have to add the force of gravity to my list of enemies.
(Lemony Snicket)

10.

obscure

(v.) make unclear, make vague; make indistinct

E.g. Fiction reveals truth that reality obscures.
(Jessamyn West)

11.

restraint

(n.) moderation or self-control; controlling force; restriction
E.g. Why are we so full of restraint? Why do we not give in all directions? Is it fear of losing ourselves? Until we do
lose ourselves there is no hope of finding ourselves.
(Henry Miller)

12.

arbitrary

(adj.) wanton, reckless; uncontrolled, unreasonable
E.g. All media exist to invest our lives with artificial perceptions and arbitrary values.
(Marshall McLuhan)

13.

detached

(adj.) separate; impartial; aloof
E.g. Too unconcerned to love and too passionless to hate, too detached to be selfish and too lifeless to be unselfish,
too indifferent to experience joy and too cold to express sorrow, they are neither dead nor alive; they merely exist.
(Martin Luther King)

1

14.

prevalence

(adj.) commonness, state of being widespread, currentness, predominance
E.g. Comedy is deemed inferior to tragedy primarily because of the social prevalence of narcissistic pathology. In other
words people who are too self-important to laugh at their own frequently ridiculous behavior have vested interest in
gravity because it supports their illusions of grandiosity.
(Tom Robbins)

15.

vigorous

(adj.) energetic; forceful; strong and healthy
E.g. We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this
unfolding conundrum of life and history, there "is" such a thing as being too late. This is no time for apathy or
complacency. This is a time for vigorous and postive action.
(Martin Luther King Jr. )

16.

rhetoric

(n.) describes speech or writing which is intended to seem important or persuasive
E.g. Out of the quarrel with others we make rhetoric; out of the quarrel with ourselves we make poetry.
(W.B. Yeats)

17.

peripheral

(adj.) circumferential; marginal
E.g. Real life was something happening in her peripheral vision.
(Rainbow Rowell)

18.

derive

(v.) obtain, gain; come from; deduce
E.g. I define connection as the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued; when they
can give and receive without judgment; and when they derive sustenance and strength from the relationship
(Brené Brown)

19.

predecessor

(n.) a person or thing that has held a position or office before another.
E.g. Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Do not bother just to be better than your contemporaries
or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself.
(William Faulkner)

20.

undermine

(v) weaken; injure or attack in a secretive or underhanded way
E.g. When people cheat in any arena, they diminish themselves-they threaten their own self-esteem and their
relationships with others by undermining the trust they have in their ability to succeed and in their ability to be true.
(Cheryl Hughes)

21.

superficial

(adj.) on or near the surface; concerned with or understanding only what is on the surface, shallow
E.g. We will gradually become indifferent to what goes on in the minds of other people when we acquire a knowledge of
the superficial nature of their thoughts, the narrowness of their views and of the number of their errors. Whoever
attaches a lot of value to the opinions of others pays them too much honor.
(Arthur Schopenhauer)

22.

proliferation

(n.) rapid growth; spread; multiplication
E.g. For nearly a century, the moral relativism of science has given faith-based religion-that great engine of ignorance
and bigotry-a nearly uncontested claim to being the only universal framework for moral wisdom. As a result, the most
powerful societies on early spend their time debating issues like gay marriage when they should be focused on problems
like nuclear proliferation, genocide, energy security, climate change, poverty, and failing schools.
(Sam Harris)

23.

pragmatic

(adj) practical; dealing with actual facts and reality
E.g. Even the most pragmatic person fell victim at times to a longing for something other.
(Kate Morton)

24.

ironic

(adj.) sarcastic, ironical
E.g. It is an ironic habit of human beings to run faster when they have lost their way.
(Rollo May)

25.

robust

(adj.) healthy
E.g. All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and
argument than others.
(Douglas Adams)

26.

disclose

(v.) reveal, divulge, expose
E.g. Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between
classes, nor between political parties either - but right through every human heart - and through all human hearts. This
line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years.
(Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)

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27.

susceptible

(adj.) open to; easily influenced; lacking in resistance
E.g. Here's something for you to remember; you might have been born into money, but you came out of a vagina the
same as everyone else. Popping out of one that's rich doesn't make you anything but lucky, or susceptible to being
stuck your own arse. Whichever.
(Suzanne Wright)

28.

proximity

(n.) adjacency, closeness
E.g. It takes so little, so infinitely little, for a person to cross the border beyond which everything loses meaning: love,
convictions, faith, history. Human life - and herein lies its secret - takes place in the immediate proximity of that border,
even in direct contact with it; it is not miles away, but a fraction of an inch.
(Milan Kundera)

29.

rigorous

(n.) harsh, strict, severe; exact, precise
E.g. We should be rigorous in judging ourselves and gracious in judging others.

(John Wesley)

30.

constraint

(n.) restriction; force
E.g. Freedom is not being a slave to any circumstance, to any constraint, to any chance; it means compelling fortune to
enter the lists on equal terms.
(Seneca the Elder)

31.

induce

(v.) cause, impel, deduce
E.g. Once upon a time there was a bear and a bee who lived in a wood and were the best of friends. All summer long the
bee collected nectar from morning to night while the bear lay on his back basking in the long grass. When winter came the
bear realised he had nothing to eat and thought to himself 'I hope that busy little bee will share some of his honey with
me.' But the bee was nowhere to be found - he had died of a stress induced coronary disease.
(Banksy)

32.

deterrent

(n.) obstacle
E.g. "I've often thought that beauty can be a
deterrent to love," Fern's father mused.
"Why?"

"Because sometimes we fall in love with a
face and not what's behind it."
(Amy Harmon)

33.

articulate

(adj.) well spoken, eloquent
E.g. Talkers are usually more articulate than doers, since talk is their specialty.
(Thomas Sowell)

34.

indifference

(n.) apathy, unconcern, detachment, disinterest
E.g. The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite
of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference."
(Elie Wiesel)

35.

predator

(n.) an animal that naturally preys on others
E.g. It's like when a kitten tries to bite something to death. The kitten clearly has the cold-blooded murderous instinct of a
predator, but at the same time, it's this cute little kitten, and all you want to do is stuff it in a shoebox and shoot a video
of it for grandmas to watch on YouTube.
(Jesse Andrews)

36.

tentative

(adj.) experimental in nature; uncertain, hesitant
E.g. It is not what the man of science believes that distinguishes him, but how and why he believes it. His beliefs are
tentative, not dogmatic; they are based on evidence, not on authority or intuition.
(Bertrand Russell)

37.

dissent

(v.) disagree on, dispute, oppose
E.g. I wish I could say that racism and prejudice were only distant memories. We must dissent from the indifference. We
must dissent from the apathy. We must dissent from the fear, the hatred and the mistrust...We must dissent because
America can do better, because America has no choice but to do better.
(Thurgood Marshall)

38.

exhaust

(v.) to use all of sth so that there is none left
E.g. When you have exhausted all possibilities, remember this - you haven't.
(Thomas A. Edison)

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39.

turbulent

(adj.) disorderly, riotous, violent; stormy
E.g. The need to go astray, to be destroyed, is an extremely private, distant, passionate, turbulent truth.
(Georges Bataille)

40.

turmoil

(n) a state of great confusion or disorder; mental strain or agitation
E.g. When I'm in turmoil, when I can't think, when I'm exhausted and afraid and feeling very, very alone, I go for walks.
It's just one of those things I do. I walk and I walk and sooner or later something comes to me, something to make me
feel less like jumping off a building.
(Jim Butcher)

41.

volatile

(adj.) highly changeable, fickle; tending to become violent or explosive
E.g. This may come as a shock to some of you, but I have a slightly volatile personality. I don't suffer fools well.
(Tucker Max)

42.

apprehension

(n.) fearful expectation or anticipation
E.g. There's always apprehension whenever I launch anything, it seems. When I launch a tour, people are always,
'Oooh, is this gonna work?' And when I launch an album: 'Ooh, is this gonna work?' Or a new video. 'Really?' It's always
like that - but I've always acted on the impulse that I have nothing to lose.
(Mika)

43.

sanction

(v.) approve; ratify
E.g. I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is
too much of a daily event for me.
(Anaïs Nin)

44.

concede

(v.) admit, yield, give up
E.g. If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation, are
men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean
without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be
both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never
will.
(Frederick Douglass)

45.

homogeneous

(adj.) the same
E.g. In scientific thinking are always present elements of poetry. Science and music requires a thought homogeneous.
(Albert Einstein)

46.

contentious

(adj.) belligerent, argumentative
E.g. It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and angry woman.
(Bible)

47.

prudent

(adj) wise in practical matters, carefully providing for the future
E.g. Run from what's comfortable. Forget safety. Live where you fear to live. Destroy your reputation. Be notorious. I
have tried prudent planning long enough. From now on I'll be mad.
(Rumi)

48.

lavish

(v.) expend profusely, give in large amounts
E.g. Great minds that are healthy are never considered geniuses, while this sublime qualification is lavished on brains
that are often inferior but are slightly touched by madness.

(Guy de Maupassant)

49.

degradation

(n.) humiliation, dishonor
E.g. I have come to the conclusion that it's a waste of time to have too much pride in anything. Perhaps it's good to
have a sense of duty, a jealous zeal to protect or improve, but pride ultimately is only that which stands vulnerable to
offense and degradation.
(Henry Rollins)

50.

ingenious

(adj.) brilliant, someone's ability to think of clever new ways of doing something
E.g. Better is possible. It does not take genius. It takes diligence. It takes moral clarity. It takes ingenuity. And above
all, it takes a willingness to try.
(Atul Gawande)

51.

mundane

(adj.) banal, normal; earthy
E.g. Today is a new day. Don't let your history interfere with your destiny! Let today be the day you stop being a victim
of your circumstances and start taking action towards the life you want. You have the power and the time to shape your
life. Break free from the poisonous victim mentality and embrace the truth of your greatness. You were not meant for a
mundane or mediocre life!

(Steve Maraboli)

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52.

transient

(adj.) lasting only a short time, fleeting; (n.) one who stays only a short time
E.g. Music isn't just a pleasure, a transient satisfaction. It's a need, a deep hunger; and when the music is right, it's joy.
Love. A foretaste of heaven. A comfort in grief.
Is it too much to think that perhaps God speaks to us sometimes through music?
How, then, could I be so ungrateful as to refuse the message?
(Orson Scott Card)

53.

innate

(adj.) inherent; inborn
E.g. You've been given the innate power to shape your life...but you cannot just speak change, you have to LIVE
change. Intent paired with action builds the bridge to success. You can't just want it; you have to do it, live it...BE it!
Success isn't something you have, it's something you DO!
(Steve Maraboli)

54.

contend

(v.) maintain, assert; compete
E.g. Only by contending with challenges that seem to be beyond your strength to handle at the moment you can grow
more surely toward the stars.
(Brian Trac)

55.

prolific

(adj.) abundantly productive; abundant, profuse
E.g. There is something heroic about the way my fans operate their cameras. So precisely, so intricately and so proudly.
Like Kings writing the history of their people, is their prolific nature that both creates and procures what will later be
perceived as the kingdom.
(Lady Gaga)

56.

archaic

(adj.) ancient; no longer used
E.g. Painting and sculpture are very archaic forms. It's the only thing left in our industrial society where an individual
alone can make something with not just his own hands, but brains, imagination, heart maybe.
(Philip Guston)

57.

discrepancy

(n.) difference, lack of accord, inconsistency
E.g. There is a serious discrepancy between what we really wants, and what we usually do to get what we think we want.

What we really want is to fill the hole inside and become complete, and what we do is look for success and growth
outside.
(Ilchi Lee)

58.

pervasive

(adj) tending to spread throughout
E.g. Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe
is always one step beyond logic.
(Frank Herbert)

59.

complacency

(n.) contentment, self-satisfaction
E.g. Complacency by the watchdogs hurts both taxpayers and beneficiaries.
(Chuck Grassley)

60.

benevolent

(adj.) charitable, kind
E.g. We both can be the most beautiful and benevolent creatures on the planet, but then there's another side that can
be as harsh and as ugly as the darkest thing you could imagine seeing.
(Terrence Howard)

61.

diffuse

(v.) spread, scatter, fan out
E.g. I learned early in life that laughter is a great way to diffuse and uncomfortable situation, so I began to use that as a
tool, throughout my life.
(Romany Malco)

62.

sporadic

(adj) occasional, happening irregularly or in scattered locations
E.g. Our society is so fragmented, our family lives so sundered by physical and emotional distance, our friendships so
sporadic, our intimacies so 'in-between' things and often so utilitarian, that there are few places where we can feel truly
safe.
(Henri J.M. Nouwen)

63.

malicious

(adj.) hateful
E.g. Don't listen to the malicious comments of those friends who, never taking any risks themselves, can only see other
people's failures.
(Paulo Coelho)

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64.

ominous

(adj.) sign of negative event
E.g. Ayn Rand's 'philosophy' is nearly perfect in its immorality, which makes the size of her audience all the more ominous
and symptomatic as we enter a curious new phase in our society.... To justify and extol human greed and egotism is to my
mind not only immoral, but evil.
(Gore Vidal)

65.

coercion

(n.) compulsion, use of force
E.g. True freedom is the capacity for acting according to one's true character, to be altogether one's self, to be selfdetermined and not subject to outside coercion.
(Corliss Lamont)

66.

mar

(v.) damage, mutilate, spoil, deface
E.g. We laugh and laugh, and nothing can ever be sad, no one can be lost, or dead, or far away: right now we are here, and
nothing can mar our perfection, or steal the joy of this perfect moment."
(Audrey Niffenegger)

67.

shudder

(v) to shake suddenly with very small movements because of a very unpleasant thought or feeling
E.g. The true genius shudders at incompleteness — imperfection — and usually prefers silence to saying the something
which is not everything that should be said.
(Edgar Allan Poe)

68.

emulate

(v.) copy
E.g. Grief and love are conjoined, you don't get one without the other. All I can do is love her, and love the world, emulate
her by living with daring and spirit and joy.
(Jandy Nelson)

69.

partisan

(n.) one who fervently supports a specific group or cause
E.g. I hate the indifferent. I believe that living means taking sides. Those who really live cannot help being a citizen and a
partisan. Indifference and apathy are parasitism, perversion, not life. That is why I hate the indifferent.
I am a partisan, I am alive, I feel the pulse of the activity of the future city that those on my side are building is alive in
their conscience. And in it, the social chain does not rest on a few; nothing of what happens in it is a matter of luck, nor the
product of fate, but the intelligent work of the citizens. Nobody in it is looking from the window of the sacrifice and the drain
of a few. Alive, I am a partisan. That is why I hate the ones that don't take sides, I hate the indifferent.
(Antonio Gramsci)

70.

salvage

(v) save from destruction, rescue
E.g. You know a relationship has deteriorated past the point of salvage when one person detests another's gestures.
(Josephine Humphreys)

71.

sage

(adj.) wise; (n.) a very wise person
E.g. To paraphrase several sages: Nobody can think and hit someone at the same time.
(Susan Sontag)

72.

diligence

(n.) persistence, perseverance, industriousness
E.g. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.
(Samuel Johnson)

73.

opaque

(n.) unclear; muddy
E.g. We exist for ourselves, perhaps, and at times we even have a glimmer of who we are, but in the end we can never be
sure, and as our lives go on, we become more and more opaque to ourselves, more and more aware of our own

incoherence. No one can cross the boundary into another - for the simple reason that no one can gain access to himself.
(Paul Auster)

74.

eloquent

(adj.) well-spoken, persuasive, convincing, silver-tongued
E.g. In my mind I am eloquent; I can climb intricate scaffolds of words to reach the highest cathedral ceilings and paint my
thoughts. But when I open my mouth, everything collapses.
(Isaac Marion)

75.

deference

(n.) respect, reverence, esteem
E.g. To have respect for ourselves guides our morals; and to have a deference for others governs our manners.
(Lawrence Sterne )

76.

devious

(adj.) dishonest, deceptive, crooked
E.g. With my physicality and my face, I don't think I could pull off a completely righteous guy. There's something devious
about my eyes. I like characters with flaws and to see how they overcome those flaws. I want to play real people, and
they're flawed, not perfect.
(Emraan Hashmi)

6


77.

preclude

(v.) to make impossible, prevent, shut out
E.g. Accepting oneself does not preclude an attempt to become better.
(Flannery O'Connor)

78.

lofty

(adj.) elevated, noble
E.g. Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude.
(Arthur Schopenhauer)

79.

austere

(adj.) strict, rigid; ascetic
E.g. I'm not shy in the spotlight. I might seem austere and even arrogant, but far from it, I'm actually shy.
(Riccardo Muti)

80.

inert

(adj.) not moving
(E.g. The only thing more painful than being an active forgetter is to be an inert rememberer."
(Jonathan Safran Foer)

81.

heterogeneous

(adj.) of different mixture
E.g. Memory has its own special kind. It selects, eliminates, alters, exaggerates, minimizes, glorifies, and vilifies also;
but in the end it creates its own reality, its heterogeneous but usually coherent version of events; and no sane human
being ever trusts someone else's version more than his own.
(Salman Rushdie)

82.

vow

(n.) a solemn or sacred promise or pledge; (v.) to declare or promise in a solemn way

83.

expedient

(adj.) worthwhile
E.g. On some positions, cowardice asks the question, is it expedient? And then expedience comes along and asks the
question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? Conscience asks the question, is it right?
There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must do it
because conscience tells him it is right.

(Martin Luther King Jr.)

84.

composure

(n.) calmness, equanimity
E.g. Genuine good taste consists in saying much in few words, in choosing among our thoughts, in having order and
arrangement in what we say, and in speaking with composure.
(Francois Fenelon)

85.

fervor

(n.) ardor, passion, eagerness; great heat
E.g. Those who direct the maximum force of their desires towards the center, toward the true being, toward perfection,
seem quieter than the passionate souls because the flame of their fervor cannot always be seen. In argument, for
example, they will not shout and wave their arms. But I assure you, they are nevertheless burning with subdued fires."
(Hermann Hesse)

86.

apathy

(n.) indifference, absence of emotion or enthusiasm
(E.g. Willpower is the key to success. Successful people strive no matter what they feel by applying their will to
overcome apathy, doubt or fear.
(Dan Millman)

87.

bolster

(v.) strengthen, reinforce
E.g. If the United Nations is to survive, those who represent it must bolster it; those who advocate it must submit to it;
and those who believe in it must fight for it.
(Norman Cousins)

88.

antagonism

(n.) opposition, resistance
E.g. My opinion on who's wrong or who's right has nothing to do with the fact that we have to bring together people who
are against each other, to transform antagonism into cooperation.
(Harri Holkeri)

89.

discern

(v.) distinguish, perceive
E.g. As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light of meaning in the darkness of
mere being.
(C.G. Jung)

90.

acclaim

(v.) praise, extol
E.g. Did you ever stop to think that a great man in life, who has won great acclaim and great reputation, is the very
man who is willing to share and give the honor to others in the doing of things that made him great?
(Charles M. Schwab)

7


91.

commemorate

(v.) honor, pay tribute
E.g. Life is a lot more interesting if you are interested in the people and the places around you. So, illuminate your
little patch of ground, the people that you know, the things that you want to commemorate. Light them up with your
art, with your music, with your writing, with whatever it is that you do.
(Alan Moore)

92.

impeccable

(adj.) faultless, perfect; free from sin, pure
E.g. Be impeccable with your word. Don't take anything personally. Don't make assumptions. Always do your best.
(Miguel Ruiz)

93.

reverence

(n.) veneration, sense of deep respect; gesture of honor
E.g. Spring passes and one remembers one's innocence.
Summer passes and one remembers one's exuberance.
Autumn passes and one remembers one's reverence.
Winter passes and one remembers one's perseverance.
(Yoko Ono)

94.

exemplary

(adj.) top
E.g. You give up on what you need to be doing because you forget that you're worth it. This is why most people aren't
leading exemplary lives...You have to believe in yourself so much that you're willing to do what's uncomfortable, timeconsuming, inconvenient, and on occasion seemingly impossible. When you don't believe in yourself this much,
pretend.
(Victoria Moran)

95.

linger

(v.) stay around, tarry, persist
E.g. Everyone makes choices in life. Some bad, some good. It's called living, and if you want to bow out, then go right
ahead. But don't do it halfway. Don't linger in whiner's limbo."
(Maria V. Snyder)

96.

sluggish

(adj.) lazy; slow-moving; not active, dull
E.g. But we never get back our youth... The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail,
our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too
much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to.
(Oscar Wilde)

97.

adversary

(n.) opponent, rival, enemy
E.g. We have been conditioned to see the passing of time as an adversary.
(Menachem Mendel Schneerson)

98.

disperse

(v.) scatter, send out; be scattered
E.g. Now I know what loneliness is, I think. Momentary loneliness, anyway. It comes from a vague core of the self - like a disease of the blood, dispersed throughout the body so that one cannot locate the matrix, the spot of
contagion.

99.

cessation

(n.) a temporary discontinuance
E.g. The Buddha said that suffering was caused by desire, we'd learned, and that the cessation of desire meant the
cessation of suffering. When you stopped wishing things wouldn't fall apart, you'd stop suffering when they did.

(John Green)

100.

disdain

(v.) contempt, scorn
E.g. The biggest moments of insecurity come when all self-confidence is lost and you feel like people are watching
and judging. It should be the opposite. You should feel like the people who are watching care about you. This is
something we can try to give each other - the feeling that eyes signal support, not disdain.
( Miley Cyrus)

101.

indignant

(adj.) irate, angry, furious; exasperated, resentful
E.g. There is perhaps no phenomenon which contains so much destructive feeling as 'moral indignation,' which permits
envy or hate to be acted out under the guise of virtue.
(Erich Fromm)

8


102.

oblivion

(n.) unawareness, state of complete forgetfulness
E.g. "I'm in love with you," he said quietly.

"Augustus," I said.
"I am," he said. He was staring at me, and I could see the corners of his eyes crinkling. "I'm in love with you, and I'm not
in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I'm in love with you, and I know that love is
just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we're all doomed and that there will come a day when
all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we'll ever have, and I am in love
with you."
(John Green)

103.

astute

(adj.) clever, acute, shrewd
E.g. One of the funny things about the stock market is that every time one person buys, another sells, and both think
they are astute.
(William Feather)

104.

piety

(n.) devotion
E.g. The world is a wonderfully weird place, consensual reality is significantly flawed, no institution can be trusted,
certainty is a mirage, security a delusion, and the tyranny of the dull mind forever threatens -- but our lives are not as
limited as we think they are, all things are possible, laughter is holier than piety, freedom is sweeter than fame, and in
the end it's love and love alone that really matters.
(Tom Robbins)

105.

superfluous

(adj.) exceeding what is sufficient or required, excess
E.g. Obedience, fasting, and prayer are laughed at, yet only through them lies the way to real true freedom. I cut off my
superfluous and unnecessary desires, I subdue my proud and wanton will and chastise it with obedience, and with God's
help I attain freedom of spirit and with it spiritual joy.
(Fyodor Dostoyevsky)

106.

erroneous

(adj.) wrong, incorrect, mistaken, inaccurate
E.g. What disturbs and depresses young people is the hunt for happiness on the firm assumption that it must be met
with in life. From this arises constantly deluded hope and so also dissatisfaction. Deceptive images of a vague
happiness hover before us in our dreams, and we search in vain for their original. Much would have been gained if,
through timely advice and instruction, young people could have had eradicated from their minds the erroneous notion that
the world has a great deal to offer them.
(Arthur Schopenhauer)

107.

rectify

(v.) make better, calibrate
E.g. No, the secret is that there's no reward and we have to endure our characters and our natures as best we can,
because no amount of experience or insight is going to rectify our deficiencies, our self-regard, or our cupidity. We have
to learn that our desires do not find any real echo in the world. We have to accept that the people we love do not love
us, or not in the way we hope. We have to accept betrayal and disloyalty, and, hardest of all, that someone is finer than
we are in character or intelligence.

(Sándor Márai)

108.

divergent

(adj.) diverging from another or a standard
E.g. I feel like someone breathed new air into my lungs. I am not Abnegation. I am not Dauntless.
I am Divergent.
(Veronica Roth)

109.

alleviate

(v.) relieve, allay, soothe
E.g. Everybody should have a fair deal; everybody should have the chance to life in this world. If we were evolved as
human beings, we would hopefully be able to alleviate suffering in the world.
(Vivienne Westwood)

110.

aloof

(adj.) unfriendly, standoffish, indifferent
E.g. I love Obama's calm and dignity. A lot of people confuse that with being aloof, but I know people that have held that
job. It's a 24-hour barrage of information.
(Stephen Stills)

111.

remorse

(n.) regret, guilty feeling
E.g. All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading
one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you: the good and the bad, the ecstasy,
the remorse and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was. If you can get so that you can give that to
people, then you are a writer.
(Ernest Hemingway)

9


112.

animosity

(n.) hatred, resentment; hostility
E.g. Suspicion and doubt lead to animosity and hatred.
(Ralph Steadman)

113.

enigma

(n.) puzzle,
E.g. I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own
mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
(Umberto Eco)

114.

disparity

(n.) inequality; difference, dissimilarity
E.g. To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence
and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never
simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To
try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.
(Arundhati Roy)

115.

affirmation

(n.) support; testimony
E.g. Practice rather than preach. Make of your life an affirmation, defined by your ideals, not the negation of others.
Dare to the level of your capability then go beyond to a higher level.
(Alexander Haig)

116.

stagnant

(adj.) not running or flowing; foul from standing still; inactive, sluggish, dull
E.g. Are you going to allow the world around you to change while you remain stagnant? Make this the time you throw
away old habits that have hindered your happiness and success and finally allow your greatest self to flourish.
(Steve Maraboli)

117.

aspire

(v.) dream, yearn
E.g. Most of us who aspire to be tops in our fields don't really consider the amount of work required to stay tops.
(Althea Gibson)

118.

relinquish

(v.) cede, surrender, give up; forsake, abandon
E.g. I know why we try to keep the dead alive: we try to keep them alive in order to keep them with us. I also know
that if we are to live ourselves there comes a point at which we must relinquish the dead, let them go, keep them
dead. "
(Joan Didion)

119.

esoteric

(adj.) obscure
E.g. But I believe we all fall in love for some esoteric and simple reason: the first time a man comes to your rescue,
the way he holds you when you kiss, his smile that has you endlessly daydreaming. I'm not sure the reason you fall is
as important as the fact that you have indeed fallen.
(David Cristofano)

120.

heresy

(n.) unorthodox opinion, belief or idea which is in opposition to established views
E.g. The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The
opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.
(Elie Wiesel)

121.

dogmatic

(adj.) opinionated, intolerant, rigid
E.g. Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing more constraining, more blinding to innovation,
more destructive of openness to novelty.
(Stephen Jay Gould)

122.

satire

(n.) a way of criticizing people or ideas in a humorous way, or a piece of writing or play which uses this style
E.g. A man is angry at a libel because it is false, but at a satire because it is true.
(G.K. Chesterton)

123.

fallacy

(n.) misconception, false belief
E.g. Money makes people rich; it is a fallacy to think it makes them better, or even that it makes them worse. People
are what they do, and what they leave behind.

(Terry Pratchett)

124.

indiscriminate

(adj.) thoughtless, careless; mixed, thrown together
E.g. Love is one of the most intense feelings felt by man; another is hate. Forcing yourself to feel indiscriminate love
is very unnatural. If you try to love everyone you only lessen your feelings for those who deserve your love.
Repressed hatred can lead to many physical and emotional aliments. By learning to release your hatred towards those
who deserve it, you cleanse yourself of these malignant emotions and need not take your pent-up hatred out on your
loved ones.
(Anton Szandor LaVey)
10


125.

ascendancy

(n.) domination, superiority, supremacy
E.g. The Japanese put houses in among the trees and allowed nature to gain the ascendancy in any composition.
(Stephen Gardiner)

126.

aversion

(n.) a feeling of intense dislike
E.g. I deeply detest social distinction and snobbery, and in that lies my strong aversion to titular honours.

(Helen Clark)

127.

conciliatory

(adj.) pacifying, appeasing
E.g. If you're not very clever you should be conciliatory.
(Benjamin Disraeli)

128.

ratify

(v.) approve, confirm
E.g. All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people
feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.
(Noam Chomsky)

129.

innocuous

(adj.) harmless
E.g. You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are living. Then you read a book... or you take
a trip... and you discover that you are not living, that you are hibernating. The symptoms of hibernating are easily
detectable: first, restlessness. The second symptom (when hibernating becomes dangerous and might degenerate into
death): absence of pleasure. That is all. It appears like an innocuous illness. Monotony, boredom, death. Millions live like
this (or die like this) without knowing it. They work in offices. They drive a car. They picnic with their families. They raise
children. And then some shock treatment takes place, a person, a book, a song, and it awakens them and saves them

from death. Some never awaken.
(Anaïs Nin)

130.

antidote

(n.) remedy
E.g. Good humor is a tonic for mind and body. It is the best antidote for anxiety and depression. It is a business asset.
It attracts and keeps friends. It lightens human burdens. It is the direct route to serenity and contentment.
(Grenville Kleiser)

131.

hamper

(v.) impede, hinder
E.g. Understanding the difference between healthy striving and perfectionism is critical to laying down the shield and
picking up your life. Research shows that perfectionism hampers success. In fact, it's often the path to depression,
anxiety, addiction, and life paralysis.
(Brené Brown)

132.

anecdote

(n.) story
(E.g. Art to me is an anecdote of the spirit, and the only means of making concrete the purpose of its varied quickness
and stillness.
(Mark Rothko)

133.

diminution

(n.) reduction
E.g. The first thing which I can record concerning myself is, that I was born. These are wonderful words. This life, to
which neither time nor eternity can bring diminution - this everlasting living soul, began. My mind loses itself in these
depths.
(Groucho Marx)

134.

perpetuate

(v.) eternalize, make everlasting
E.g. Resentment always hurts you more than it does the person you resent. While your offender has probably forgotten
the offense and gone on with life, you continue to stew in your pain, perpetuating the past. Listen: those who hurt you in
the past cannot continue to hurt you now unless you hold on to the pain through resentment. Your past is past! Nothing
will change it. You are only hurting yourself with your bitterness. For your own sake, learn from it, and then let it go.
(Rick Warren)

135.

unscathed

(adj.) wholly unharmed, not injured
E.g. It's impossible to go through life unscathed. Nor should you want to. By the hurts we accumulate, we measure both
our follies and our accomplishments."
(Christopher Paolini)

136.

pacifist

(n.) lover of peace
E.g. Wise men are not pacifists; they are merely less likely to jump up and retaliate against their antagonizers. They
know that needless antagonizers are virtually already insecure enough.
(Criss Jami)

11


137.

cryptic

(adj.) obscure, puzzling, concealing
E.g. Maps encourage boldness. They're like cryptic love letters. They make anything seem possible.
(Mark Jenkins)

138.

lament

(v.) mourn, grieve for
E.g. Both looked back then on the wild revelry...and they lamented that it had cost them so much of their lives to find
the paradise of shared solitude."
(Gabriel Garcí¬a Márquez)

139.

refute

(v.) dispute, rebut, disprove, prove false
E.g.There are also those who inadvertently grant power to another man's words by continuously trying to spite him. If a
man gets to the point where he can simply say, 'The sky is blue,' and people indignantly rush up trying to refute him
saying, 'No, the sky is light blue,' then, whether they realize it or not, he has become an authority figure even to such
adversaries.
(Criss Jami)

140.

censure

(n.) harsh criticism or disapproval
E.g. It is folly for an eminent man to think of escaping censure, and a weakness to be affected with it. All the illustrious
persons of antiquity, and indeed of every age in the world, have passed through this fiery persecution.
(Joseph Addison)

141.

incongruous

(adj.) inhamornious, inconsistent
E.g. A lonely, quiet person has observations and experiences that are at once both more indistinct and more penetrating
than those of one more gregarious; his thoughts are weightier, stranger, and never without a tinge of sadness. . . .
Loneliness fosters that which is original, daringly and bewilderingly beautiful, poetic. But loneliness also fosters that
which is perverse, incongruous, absurd, forbidden.
(Thomas Mann)

142.

profusion

(n.) a plentiful supply; a great or generous amount
E.g. I'll admit that my garden now grows hope in lavish profusion, leaving little room for anything else. I suppose it has
squeezed out more practical plants like caution and common sense. Still, though, hope does not flourish in every
garden, and I feel thankful it has taken root in mine.
(Sharon Kay Penman)

143.

unwarranted

(adj.) unjustified; groundless; undeserved
E.g. The unwarranted devotion. Putting up with the fear of being with the wrong person because you can't deal with the
fear of being alone. The hope tinged with doubt, and the doubt tinged with hope. Every time I see these feelings in
someone else's face, it weighs me down.
(David Levithan)

144.

mitigate

(v.) soften in force or severity; lessen the impact or intensity of; appease, make easier, sweeten
E.g. Yes, it's vital to make lifestyle choices to mitigate damage caused by being a member of industrialized civilization,
but to assign primary responsibility to oneself, and to focus primarily on making oneself better, is an immense copout,
an abrogation of responsibility."
(Derrick Jensen)

145.

renounce

(v.) to give up or resign something
E.g. But time, as well as healing all wounds, taught me something strange too: that it's possible to love more than one
person in a lifetime. I remarried. I'm very happy with my new wife, and I can't imagine living without her. This, however,
doesn't mean that I have to renounce all my past experiences, as long as I'm careful not to compare my two lives. You
can't measure love the way you can the length of a road or the height of a building.
(Paulo Coelho)

146.

cursory

(adj.) quick and probably not detailed
E.g. We do not talk - we bludgeon one another with facts and theories gleaned from cursory readings of newspapers,
magazines and digests.

147.

adversity

(n) hardship, adverse fortune
E.g. Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.
(Napoleon Hill)

148.

implausible

(adj.) not feasible
E.g. There is boring. There is sensational. There is mediocre. There is lazy. There is good. There is evil. People do
implausible things all the time, and they run the gamut of moderately weird to truly extraordinary. But there is no normal.
The world is an unbelievable place full of unbelievable people doing unbelievable things.
(Penny Reid)

12


149.

augment

(v.) improve, enlarge, enhance
E.g. There are two ways of being happy: We must either diminish our wants or augment our means - either may do - the
result is the same and it is for each man to decide for himself and to do that which happens to be easier.
(Benjamin Franklin)

150.

eclectic

(adj.) odd; obscure
E.g. Postmodernity is said to be a culture of fragmentary sensations, eclectic nostalgia, disposable simulacra, and
promiscuous superficiality, in which the traditionally valued qualities of depth, coherence, meaning, originality, and
authenticity are evacuated or dissolved amid the random swirl of empty signals.
(Jean Baudrillard)

151.

elation

(n.) a state of extreme happiness or excitement
E.g. Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality. When we recognize our place in
an immensity of light‐years and in the passage of ages, when we grasp the intricacy, beauty, and subtlety of life, then
that soaring feeling, that sense of elation and humility combined, is surely spiritual. So are our emotions in the presence
of great art or music or literature, or acts of exemplary selfless courage such as those of Mohandas Gandhi or Martin
Luther King, Jr. The notion that science and spirituality are somehow mutually exclusive does a disservice to both.
(Carl Sagan)

152.

impair

(v.) hinder, spoil, mar, damage, weaken
E.g. Real strength never impairs beauty or harmony, but it often bestows it, and in everything imposingly beautiful,
strength has much to do with the magic."
(Herman Melville)

153.

artisan

(n.) craftsman, skilled workman
E.g. I am an artisan. I only became an artist when people watch what I do. That is when it becomes art.
(Rhys Ifans)

154.

denounce

(v.) condemn, criticize
E.g. Denounce useless guilt. Don't make a cult of suffering. Live in the now (or at least the soon). Always do the things
you fear most. Courage is an acquired taste like caviar. Trust all joy. If the evil eye fixes you in its gaze, look elsewhere.
Get ready to be 87.
(Erica Jong)

155.

furtive

(adj.) surreptitious, stealthy; sly, shifty
E.g. We can never go back again, that much is certain. The past is still close to us. The things we have tried to forget
and put behind us would stir again, and that sense of fear, of furtive unrest, struggling at length to blind unreasoning
panic - now mercifully stilled, thank God - might in some manner unforeseen become a living companion as it had before."
(Daphne du Maurier)

156.

deplorable

(adj.) Distressing; pitiable; scandalous
E.g. He who joyfully marches to music rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by
mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once.
Heroism at command, senseless brutality, deplorable love-of-country stance and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by
the name of patriotism, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds
than be part of so base an action! It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.
(Albert Einstein)

157.

ephemeral

(adj.) short-lived
E.g. Thoughts are ephemeral, they evaporate in the moment they occur, unless they are given action and material form.
Wishes and intentions, the same. Meaningless, unless they impel you to one choice or another, some deed or course of
action, however insignificant. Thoughts that lead to action can be dangerous. Thoughts that do not, mean less than
nothing.
(Ann Leckie)

158.

altruistic

(adj.) selfless, devoted to others
E.g. We are selfish when we are exclusively or predominantly concerned with the good for ourselves. We are altruistic
when we are exclusively or predominantly concerned with the good of others.
(Mortimer Adler)

159.

notoriety

(n.) reputation, infamy,
E.g. Men often mistake notoriety for fame, and would rather be noticed for their vices than not be noticed at all.
(Harry S. Truman)

13

160.

exuberance

(n.) enthusiasm, ebullience
E.g. Passion has little to do with euphoria and everything to do with patience. It is not about feeling good. It is about
endurance. Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati. It does not mean to flow with exuberance. It
means to suffer.
(Mark Z. Danielewski)

161.

discord

(n) disharmony, dissension, disagreement
E.g. Out of clutter, find simplicity. From discord, find harmony. In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.
(Albert Einstein)

162.

impede

(v.) hinder, delay, obstruct; hinder, thwart, prevent
E.g. I will not be "famous," "great." I will go on adventuring, changing, opening my mind and my eyes, refusing to be
stamped and stereotyped. The thing is to free one's self: to let it find its dimensions, not be impeded.
(Virginia Woolf)

163.

submissive

(adj.) compliant, obedient
E.g. Every woman who is aroused by submission is also aroused by an alpha male who can tame her. These women
aren't looking for a husband in the bedroom who will make them feel safe and loved. They already have that in their
relationship. These women are looking for a man who is strong enough to conquer them. That way the woman can still
feel vibrant and independent... but also feel comfortable submitting to their lover. That's the turn-on for women. They
don't want to be submissive... they want to feel like they can't resist submitting.
(Jason Luke)

164.

seclusion

(n.) isolation; solitude
E.g. I need to be alone. I need to ponder my shame and my despair in seclusion; I need the sunshine and the paving
stones of the streets without companions, without conversation, face to face with myself, with only the music of my heart
for company.
(Henry Miller)

165.

exacerbate

(v.) make worse
E.g. It's effortless to let go of self-absorbed people. It's challenging to let go of someone you care about and it's
exceedingly difficult to let go of an ideal and a belief in someone because what exacerbates the disappointment of finding
out they weren't who they presented themselves to be, is the betrayal of it.
(Donna Lynn Hope)

166.

gratuitous

(adj.) not necessary; with no cause
E.g. And I realize how useless wails are and how gratuitous melancholy is.
(Mircea Eliade)

167.

virtuoso

(n.) a brilliant performer; a person with masterly skill or technique
E.g. Where we are from... stories are factual. If a farmer is declared a music virtuoso by the state, everyone had better
start calling him maestro. And secretly, he'd be wise to start practicing the piano. For us, the story is more important
than the person. If a man and his story are in conflict, it is the man who must change.
(Adam Johnson)

168.

obstinate

(adj.) stubborn, bullheaded; inflexible
E.g. Charlotte slammed the paper down onto her desk with an exclamation of rage. "Aloysius Starkweather is the most
stubborn, hypocritical, obstinate, degenerate—" She broke off, clearly fighting for control of her temper. Tessa had never
seen Charlotte's mouth so firmly set into a hard line.
"Would you like a thesaurus?" Will inquired. "You seem to be running out of words."
(Cassandra Clare)

169.

antiquated

(adj.) out-of-date, obsolete
E.g. No idea is so antiquated that it was not once modern. No idea is so modern that it will not someday be antiquated.
(Ellen Glasgow)

170.

brevity

(n.) shortness, terseness
E.g. Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity.
(William Zinsser)

171.

repel

(v.) repulse, reject
(E.g. I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.
(F. Scott Fitzgerald)

14


172.

scrupulous

(adj.) exact, careful, attending thoroughly to details; having high moral standards, principled
E.g. A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus: 1. What am I
trying to say? 2. What words will express it? 3. What image or idiom will make it clearer? 4. Is this image fresh
enough to have an effect?
(George Orwell)

173.

gullible

(adj.) naive; trusting
E.g. If others think I am nuts, naive, gullible, and not living in the real world, that's all right, too... I'll gladly stay in
what some have called my fictitious world, my happy and peaceful world, a world full of signs of hope.
(Ward Foley)

174.

hypocritical

(adj.) two-faced, insincere, duplicitous, false
E.g. I wore black because I liked it. I still do, and wearing it still means something to me. It's still my symbol of
rebellion -- against a stagnant status quo, against our hypocritical houses of God, against people whose minds are
closed to others' ideas.
(Johnny Cash)

175.

intrepid

(adj.) brave, fearless
E.g. Fortune helps the intrepid and abandons the cowards. I am the daughter of a man who did not know of fear.
Whatever may come, I am resolved to follow that course until death.
(Caterina Sforza)

176.

anarchist

(n.) revolutionary, a person in favor of lawlessness
E.g. All comedians are, in a way, anarchists. Our job is to make fun of the existing world.
(Bob Newhart)

177.

analogous

(adj.) parallel; similar, comparable
(E.g. The director is a bit analogous to the conductor of a symphony orchestra. It's a collaborative adventure.
(Nicholas Meyer)

178.

appease

(adj.) placate, soothe, bring peace
E.g. All attempts to appease the Nazis between 1934 and 1939 through various agreements and pacts were morally
unacceptable and politically senseless, harmful and dangerous.
(Vladimir Putin)

179.

gregariousness

(n.) quality of being outgoing, sociability
E.g. Love is essential, gregariousness is optional.
(Susan Cain)

180.

disseminate

(v.) scatter, spread, disperse
E.g. I'm not better, you know. The weight hasn't left my head. I feel how easily I could fall back into it, lie down and
not eat, waste my time and curse wasting my time, look at my homework and freak out and go and chill at Aaron's,
look at Nia and be jealous again, take the subway home and hope that it has an accident, go and get my bike and
head to the Brooklyn Bridge. All of that is still there. The only thing is, it's not an option now. It's just... a possibility,
like it's a possibility that I could turn to dust in the next instant and be disseminated throughout the universe as an
omniscient consciousness. It's not a very likely possibility.
(Ned Vizzini)

181.

repudiation

(n.) rejection, disavowal; act of disowning, renouncement; denial, refusal; condemnation
E.g. First, we think all truth is beautiful, no matter how hideous its face may seem. We accept all of nature, without
any repudiation. We believe there is more beauty in a harsh truth than in a pretty lie, more poetry in earthiness than
in all the salons of Paris. We think pain is good because it is the most profound of all human feelings. We think sex
is beautiful even when portrayed by a harlot and a pimp. We put character above ugliness, pain above prettiness and

hard, crude reality above all the wealth in France. We accept life in its entirety without making moral judgments. We
think the prostitute is as good as the countess, the concierge as good as the general, the peasant as good as the
cabinet minister, for they all fit into the pattern of nature and are woven into the design of life!
(Irving Stone)

182.

terse

(adj.) brief and to the point
E.g. Briefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point. Reading
is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting. Briefing closes down a subject, reading opens it up.
(Alan Bennett)

15


183.

morose

(adj.) depressed, gloomy, irritable, bitter
E.g. So avoid using the word 'very' because it's lazy. A man is not very tired, he is exhausted. Don't use very sad, use
morose. Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women - and, in that endeavor, laziness will not do. It also
won't do in your essays.
(N.H. Kleinbaum)

184.

concur

(v.) agree
E.g. For the creation of a masterwork of literature two powers must concur, the power of the man and the power of the
moment, and the man is not enough without the moment.
(Matthew Arnold)

185.

capricious

(adj.) impulsive, fickle, changeable
E.g. As love without esteem is capricious and volatile; esteem without love is languid and cold.
(Jonathan Swift)

186.

cordial

(adj.) friendly, affable, amiable, genial
E.g. Tolerance is the positive and cordial effort to understand another's beliefs, practices, and habits without necessarily
sharing or accepting them.
(Joshua Loth Liebman)

187.

reprimand

(n.) a rebuke, an act or expression of criticism and censure
E.g. Destiny is a lie. Destiny is justification for atrocity. It is the means by which murderers armour themselves against
reprimand. It is a word intended to stand in place of ethics, denying all moral context.

(Steven Erikson)

188.

affable

(adj.) friendly
E.g. I wasn't good at being affable. You get beyond that and realise the attraction in any human being has more to do with
what they give to someone rather than just being face candy.
(Alison Moyet)

189.

fastidious

(adj.) hard to please, critical
(E.g. People who are too fastidious towards the finite never reach actuality, but linger in abstraction, and their light dies
away."
(Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel)

190.

placate

(v.) to appease, soothe, pacify
E.g. I am not one of those weak-spirited, sappy Americans who want to be liked by all the people around them. I don't
care if people hate my guts; I assume most of them do. The important question is whether they are in a position to do
anything about it. My affections, being concentrated over a few people, are not spread all over Hell in a vile attempt to
placate sulky, worthless shits.
(William S. Burroughs)

191.

reticence

(n.) taciturnity, uncommunicativeness
E.g. She was a dark, unenduring little flower - yet he thought he detected in her some quality of spiritual reticence, of
strength drawn from her passive acceptance of all things. In this he was mistaken.
(F. Scott Fitzgerald)

192.

condone

(v.) forgive, pardon, overlook
E.g. As a global society, we do not have to agree, endorse or condone the lifestyle choices of others. However, history
has taught us that we equally cannot and should not excuse those who would hide behind religion or misuse God's word to
justify bigotry and persecution.
(Joyce Meyer)

193.

scanty

(adj.) inadequate, meager; insufficient
E.g. It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents, except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a
violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and
fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.
(Edward Bulwer-Lytton)

194.

lethargic

(adj.) lazy
(E.g. The people do not complain because they have no voice; do not move because they are lethargic, and you say that
they do not suffer because you have not seen their hearts bleed."
(José Rizal)

16


195.

enmity

(n.) hatred
E.g. Cities were always like people, showing their varying personalities to the traveler. Depending on the city and on the
traveler, there might begin a mutual love, or dislike, friendship, or enmity. Where one city will rise a certain individual to
glory, it will destroy another who is not suited to its personality. Only through travel can we know where we belong or not,
where we are loved and where we are rejected.
(Roman Payne)

196.

negate

(v.) to cause something to have no effect and therefore to be useless
E.g. I had jumped off the edge, and then, at the very last moment, something reached out and caught me in midair. That
something is what I define as love. It is the one thing that can stop a man from falling, powerful enough to negate the

laws of gravity.
(Paul Auster)

197.

precocious

(adj.) showing unusually early development (especially in talents and mental capacity)
E.g. When I pretended to be precocious, people started the rumor that I was precocious. When I acted like an idler, rumor
had it I was an idler. When I pretended I couldn't write a novel, people said I couldn't write. When I acted like a liar, they
called me a liar. When I acted like a rich man, they started the rumor I was rich. When I feigned indifference, they
classed me as the indifferent type. But when I inadvertently groaned because I was really in pain, they started the rumor
that I was faking suffering. The world is out of joint.
(Osamu Dazai)

198.

extraneous

(adj.) inessential, irrelevant; external, coming from the outside
E.g. I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have
an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered only at
a price I cannot afford to give.
(Charlotte Brontë)

199.

prodigal

(adj) wasteful, extravagant; giving abundantly, lavish

E.g. Never cease loving a person, and never give up hope for him, for even the prodigal son who had fallen most low,
could still be saved; the bitterest enemy and also he who was your friend could again be your friend; love that has grown
cold can kindle.
(Søren Kierkegaard)

200.

flagrant

(adj.) blatant, shameless, shocking because of being so obvious
E.g. Beautiful sunshine, cloudless skies, no one to play with, nothing to do. Living like this, the way I'm living at the
moment, is harder in the summer when there is so much daylight, so little cover of darkness, when everyone is out and
about, being flagrantly, aggressively happy. It's exhausting, and it makes you feel bad if you're not joining in.
(Paula Hawkins)

201.

adulation

(n) flattery, fawning
E.g. Most good programmers do programming not because they expect to get paid or get adulation by the public, but
because it is fun to program.
(Linus Torvalds)

202.

ascetic

(adj.) self-denying, abstinent
E.g. Religions, which condemn the pleasures of sense, drive men to seek the pleasures of power. Throughout history

power has been the vice of the ascetic.
(Bertrand Russell)

203.

ponderous

(adj) heavy; bulky and unwieldy; dull, labored
E.g. In their youth, mortals behave more like nymphs. Adulthood seems impossibly distant, let alone the enfeeblement of
old age. But ponderously, inevitably, it overtakes you.
(Brandon Mull)

204.

fanaticism

(n.) over enthusiasm
E.g. I'm for open-mindedness and tolerance. I'm against any form of fanaticism, fundamentalism or zealotry, and this
certainty of 'We have the truth.' The truth is far too large and complex. Nobody has the truth.
(Philip Pullman)

205.

candor

(n.) honesty, forthrightness
E.g. Candor is a compliment; it implies equality. It's how true friends talk.
(Peggy Noonan)

17

206.

orator

(n.) public speaker
E.g. Words have a magical power. They can bring either the greatest happiness or deepest despair; they can
transfer knowledge from teacher to student; words enable the orator to sway his audience and dictate its decisions.
Words are capable of arousing the strongest emotions and prompting all men's actions.
(Sigmund Freud)

207.

decorum

(n.) good manner; etiquette, seemliness
E.g. Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long
as possible with the trousers of decorum.
(Georg C. Lichtenberg)

208.

inconsequential

(adj.) unimportant, insignificant; irrelevant; illogical
E.g. I care," he said in a trembling voice. "I care so much that I do not know how to tell you without it seeming
inconsequential compared to how I feel. Even if I am distant at times and seem as if I do not want to be with you, it
is only because this scares me, too."
( Aimee Carter)

209.

recluse

(n.) a person who leads a life shut up or withdrawn from the world
E.g. Normally seven minutes of another person's company was enough to give her a headache so she set things up
to live as a recluse. She was perfectly content as long as people left her in peace. Unfortunately society was not
very smart or understanding.
(Stieg Larsson)

210.

ostentatious

(adj.) marked by conspicuous or pretentious display, showy
E.g. Sentimentality, the ostentatious parading of excessive and spurious emotion, is the mark of dishonesty...the
wet eyes of the sentimentalist betray his aversion to experience, his fear of life, his arid heart; and it is always,
therefore, the signal of secret and violent inhumanity, the mark of cruelty.
(James Baldwin)

211.

recount

(v.) tell again
E.g. This is what I thought: for the most banal event to become an adventure, you must (and this is enough) begin to
recount it. This is what fools people: a man is always a teller of tales, he sees everything that happens to him
through them; and he tries to live his own life as if he were telling a story.
But you have to choose: live or tell.

(Jean-Paul Sartre)

212.

extricate

(v.) untangle, release, free
E.g. Do not sleep under a roof. Carry no money or food. Go alone to places frightening to the common brand of men.
Become a criminal of purpose. Be put in jail, and extricate yourself by your own wisdom.
(Miyamoto Musashi)

213.

euphemism

(n.) less severe word
E.g. Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depend on simplicity - I mean the true simplicity of a
rightly and nobly ordered mind and character, not that other simplicity which is only a euphemism for folly.
(Plato)

214.

trite

(adj.) unoriginal, expressed too frequently to be interesting or seem sincere
E.g. Rejoicing in ordinary things is not sentimental or trite. It actually takes guts. Each time we drop our complaints
and allow everyday good fortune to inspire us, we enter the warrior's world.
(Pema Chödrön)

215.

despondent

(adj.) depressed, dejected, gloomy, melancholy
E.g. A word or a smile is often enough to put fresh life in a despondent soul.
(Thérèse de Lisieux)

216.

immutable

(adj.) unchangeable
E.g. Of course it hurt that we could never love each other in a physical way. We would have been far more happy if
we had. But that was like the tides, the change of seasons -something immutable, an immovable destiny we could
never alter. No matter how cleverly we might shelter it, our delicate friendship wasn't going to last forever. We were
bound to reach a dead end. That was painfully clear.
(Haruki Murakami)

217.

servile

(adj.) subservient, of or relating to a slave; behaving like or suitable for a slave or a servant, menial; lacking spirit or
independence, abjectly submissive
E.g. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or
wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.
(Theodore Roosevelt)

18

218.

confound

(v.) bewilder, confuse; mix up
E.g. As every divided kingdom falls, so every mind divided between many studies confounds and saps itself.
(Leonardo DaVinci)

219.

whimsical

(adj.) subject to odd ideas, notions, or fancies; playful, unpredictable
E.g. One who has loved truly, can never lose entirely. Love is whimsical and temperamental. Its nature is ephemeral, and
transitory. It comes when it pleases, and goes away without warning. Accept and enjoy it while it remains, but spend no
time worrying about its departure. Worry will never bring it back.
(Napoleon Hill)

220.

duplicity

(n.) deception; being two-faced
E.g. Those who blamed aggression formed Amity.
Those who blamed ignorance became the Erudite
Those who blamed duplicity created Candor.
Those who blamed selfishness made Abnegation.
And those who blamed cowardice were the Dauntless.
(Veronica Roth)

221.

rancor

(n.) bitter resentment or ill-will
E.g. It began to seem that one would have to hold in the mind forever two ideas which seemed to be in opposition. The
first idea was acceptance, the acceptance, totally without rancor, of life as it is, and men as they are: in the light of this
idea, it goes without saying that injustice is a commonplace. But this did not mean that one could be complacent, for the
second idea was of equal power: that one must never, in one own's life, accept these injustices as commonplace but
must fight them with all one's strength.
(James Baldwin)

222.

obliterate

(v.) destroy, erase
E.g. I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will
permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the
fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
(Frank Herbert, Dune)

223.

curtailment

(n.) reducing, shortening
E.g. Every season is likeable, and wet days and fine, red wine and white, company and solitude. Even sleep, that
deplorable curtailment of the joy of life, can be full of dreams; and the most common actions.

(Virginia Woolf)

224.

guile

(adj.) deceit, duplicity; fraud, cunning; trickery
E.g. I'm not a person who thinks they can have it all, but I certainly feel that with a bit of effort and guile I should be able
to have more than my fair share.
(George Carlin)

225.

inadvertent

(adj.) unintentional, negligent, careless, heedless; accidental; neglectful
E.g. I had inadvertently walked through a door that I shouldn't have gone through and couldn't get back to the place I
hadn't meant to leave.
(William Maxwell)

226.

listless

(adj.) lifeless
E.g. I was anti-everything and everyone. I didn't want people around me. This aversion was not some big crippling
anxiety; merely a mature recognition of my own psychological vulnerability and my lack of suitability as a companion.
Thoughts jostled for space in my crowded brain as i struggled to give them some order which might serve to motivate my
listless life.
(Irvine Welsh)

227.

surpass

(v.) to exceed or go beyond
E.g. Finally I am coming to the conclusion that my highest ambition is to be what I already am. That I will never fulfill my
obligation to surpass myself unless I first accept myself, and if I accept myself fully in the right way, I will already have
surpassed myself.
(Thomas Merton)

228.

incision

(n.) a sharp cut made in something
E.g. If the incision of our words amounts to nothing but a feeling, a slow motion, it will still cut a better swath than the
factory model, the corporate model, the penitentiary model, which by my lights are one and the same.
(C.D. Wright)

19


229.

vindicate

(v.) prove innocence
E.g. Don't concern yourself with being right in others' eyes. And don't secretly hope that their lives will fall apart so
that your opinion will be vindicated. Instead, concentrate on obeying God in your own life and, when possible, helping

others to obey Him as well. You don't have to prove others wrong to continue on the course you know God has shown
you.
(Joshua Harris)

230.

invert

(v.) reverse, turn upside down, turn inside out
E.g. A relationship is like a holiday from loneliness, beginning and ending in the same airport. The most awful thing
about the end is that it reminds you so clearly of the beginning with the joy with which you set off. Everything is the
same, yet everything has been inverted by grief.
(Louis Buss)

231.

laud

(v.) praise, commend
(E.g. If anyone says that the best life of all is to sail the sea, and then adds that I must not sail upon a sea where
shipwrecks are a common occurrence and there are often sudden storms that sweep the helmsman in an adverse
direction, I conclude that this man, although he lauds navigation, really forbids me to launch my ship."
(Seneca)

232.

presumptuous

(adj.) arrogant, haughty
(E.g. Be thankful that you have a life, and forsake your vain and presumptuous desire for a second one."

(Richard Dawkins)

233.

depraved

(adj.) Vicious; unreformable; perverted
(E.g. The most depraved type of human being is the man without a purpose.
(Ayn Rand)

234.

retract

(v.) take back
(E.g. Those who never retract their opinions love themselves more than they love truth.
(Joseph Joubert)

235.

taciturn

(adj.) habitually silent or quiet, inclined to talk very little
(E.g. The observations and encounters of a solitary, taciturn man are vaguer and at the same times more intense than
those of a sociable man; his thoughts are deeper, odder and never without a touch of sadness. Images and
perceptions that could be dismissed with a glance, a laugh, an exchange of opinions, occupy him unduly, become
more intense in the silence, become significant, become an experience, an adventure, an emotion. Solitude produces
originality, bold and astonishing beauty, poetry. But solitude also produces perverseness, the disproportionate, the
absurd and the forbidden.
(Thomas Mann)

236.

conflagration

(n.) large fire, inferno, hell
(E.g. The most intense conflicts, if overcome, leave behind a sense of security and calm that is not easily disturbed.
It is just these intense conflicts and their conflagration which are needed to produce valuable and lasting results.
(Carl Jung)

237.

opulence

(n). wealth, affluence
(E.g. We have created a manic world nauseous with the pursuit of material wealth. Many also bear their cross of
imagined deprivation, while their fellow human beings remain paralyzed by real poverty. We drown in the thick
sweetness of our sensual excess, and our shameless opulence, while our discontent souls suffocate in the arid
wasteland of spiritual deprivation.
(Anthon St. Maarten )

238.

instigate

(v.) provoke, incite, excite
(E.g. Conflict is the gadfly of thought. It stirs us to observation and memory. It instigates invention. It shocks us out
of sheep-like passivity, and sets us at noting and contriving...conflict is a sine qua non of reflection and ingenuity.
(John Dewey)

239.

reprehensible

(adj.) very bad, deserving blame or punishment
(E.g. And the flesh is that reprehensible preference for self that lurks within every one of our hearts. It is that base
and selfish instinct to preserve our own interests at the expense of God's interests. It's devious, it's deceitful, it's
self-indulgent. It's interested only in selfish comfort and will happily crucify Christ afresh to secure it. God also has
another name for it- sin.
(Eric Ludy)

240.

inane

(adj.) silly, foolish, lacking sense; empty, void
(E.g. To agree without understanding is inane. To disagree without understanding is impudent.

20


241.

insipid

(adj.) dull, bland, lacking flavor
(E.g. I certainly must,' said she. 'This sensation of listlessness, weariness, stupidity, this disinclination to sit down and
employ myself, this feeling of everything's being dull and insipid about the house! I must be in love; I should be the
oddest creature in the world if I were not. (Jane Austen)

242.

surreptitious

(adj.) sneaky, furtive
(E.g. Propaganda is as powerful as heroin; it surreptitiously dissolves all capacity to think."
(Gil Courtemanche)

243.

usurp

(v.) to seize by force, take possession of without right
(E.g. Narrow minds devoid of imagination. Intolerance, theories cut off from reality, empty terminology, usurped ideals,
inflexible systems. Those are the things that really frighten me. What I absolutely fear and loathe.
(Haruki Murakami)

244.

credulity

(n.) gullibility, naivete
(E.g. The only disadvantage of an honest heart is credulity.
(Philip Sidney)

245.

exaltation

(n.) a feeling of very great joy or happiness

(E.g. My mind," he said, "rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram
or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. I can dispense then with artificial stimulants. But
I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for mental exaltation. That is why I have chosen my own particular
profession, or rather created it, for I am the only one in the world.
(Arthur Conan Doyle)

246.

expedite

(v.) speed up, accelerate, facilitate
E.g. The art of statesmanship is to foresee the inevitable and to expedite its occurrence.
(Charles Maurice de Talleyrand)

247.

frivolity

(n.) light-heartedness, flippancy, foolishness, silliness
(E.g. When you're a teenager, your friends are your life. When you grow up, friendships seem to get pushed further and
further back, until it seems like a luxury, a frivolity, like a bubble bath."
(Sarah Addison Allen)

248.

rebuttal

(n) refutation; response with contrary evidence, counterargument
(E.g. Violence is what people do when they run out of good ideas. It's attractive because it's simple, it's direct, it's
almost always available as an option. When you can't think of a good rebuttal for your opponent's argument, you can

always punch them in the face.
(James S.A. Corey)

249.

quandary

(n) uncertainty or confusion about what to do, dilemma
(E.g. The day after his father left, Franz and his mother went into town together, and as they left home Franz noticed
that her shoes did not match. He was in a quandary: he wanted to point out the mistake, but was afraid he would hurt
her. So, during the two hours they spent walking through the city together he kept his eyes focused on her feet. It was
then he had his first inkling of what it means to suffer.
(Milan Kundera)

250.

erudition

(n.) learning, scholarship, knowledge
(E.g. The ceaseless, senseless demand for original scholarship in a number of fields, where only erudition is now
possible, has led either to sheer irrelevancy, the famous knowing of more and more about less and less, or to the
development of a pseudo-scholarship which actually destroys its object.
(Hannah Arendt)

251.

insularity

(n.) state of being narrow-minded
(E.g. Insularity is the foundation of ethnocentrism and intolerance; when you only know of those like yourself, it is easy

to imagine that you are alone in the world or alone in being good and right in the world. Exposure to diversity, on the
contrary, is the basis for relativism and tolerance; when you are forced to face and accept the Other as real,
unavoidable, and ultimately valuable, you cannot help but see yourself and your 'truths' in a new - and trouble - way.
(David Eller)

252.

scrutinize

(v.) to examine closely
(E.g. If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is
overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for
acting in accordance to his instincts, he will accept it even on the slightest evidence. The origin of myths is explained
in this way.
(Bertrand Russell)

21


253.

censorious

(adj.) fault-finding, critical
(E.g. I am quite strict as a dad but I don't want to be censorious.
(Nick Clegg)

254.

disinclination

(n) reluctance, unwillingness
E.g. Viscosity and velocity are opposites, yet they can look the same. Viscosity causes the stillness of
disinclination, velocity causes the stillness of fascination. An observer can't tell if a person is silent and still because
inner life has stalled or because inner life is transfixingly busy.
(Susanna Kaysen)

255.

impudent

(adj.) rude, impertinent
E.g. Never assume that the person you are dealing with is weaker or less important than you are. Some people are
slow to take offense, which may make you misjudge the thickness of their skin, and fail to worry about insulting them.
But should you offend their honor and their pride, they will overwhelm you with a violence that seems sudden and
extreme given their slowness to anger. If you want to turn people down, it is best to do so politely and respectfully,
even if you feel their request is impudent or their offer ridiculous.
(Robert Greene)

256.

digress

(v.) deviate, divagate, wander
(E.g. For if the modern mind is whimsical and discursive, the classical mind is narrow, unhesitating, relentless. It is not
a quality of intelligence that one encounters frequently these days. But though I can digress with the best of them, I
am nothing in my soul if not obsessive.
(Donna Tartt)

257.

nonchalance

(n.) apathy, indifference; composure
E.g. She had acquired some of his gypsy ways, some of his nonchalance, his bohemian indiscipline. She had swung
with him into the disorders of strewn clothes, spilled cigarette ashes, slipping into bed all dressed, falling asleep thus,
indolence, timelessness...A region of chaos and moonlight. She liked it there.
(Anaïs Nin)

258.

tranquility

(n) calmness; peace
E.g. Quiet is peace. Tranquility. Quiet is turning down the volume knob on life. Silence is pushing the off button.
Shutting it down. All of it. - Amir
(Khaled Hosseini)

259.

squander

(v.) fritter away, waste
E.g. What's friendship's realest measure?
I'll tell you. The amount of precious time you'll squander on someone else's calamities and ****-ups.
(Richard Ford)

260.

egotism

(n.) self-importance
E.g. It has always seemed strange to me...The things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty,
understanding and feeling, are the concomitants of failure in our system. And those traits we detest, sharpness, greed,
acquisitiveness, meanness, egotism and self-interest, are the traits of success. And while men admire the quality of
the first they love the produce of the second.
(John Steinbeck)

261.

embellish

(v.) decorate
E.g. We are like children building a sand castle. We embellish it with beautiful shells, bits of driftwood, and pieces of
colored glass. The castle is ours, off limits to others. We're willing to attack if others threaten to hurt it. Yet despite all
our attachment, we know that the tide will inevitably come in and sweep the sand castle away. The trick is to enjoy it
fully but without clinging, and when the time comes, let it dissolve back into the sea.
(Pema Chödrön)

262.

eulogy

(n.) speech praising and commending an individual (especially one who has died)
E.g. I think eulogies are wasted on the dead. It's the living who need to hear kind words spoken about them.
(Jarod Kintz)

263.

relegate

(v.) to place in a lower position; to assign, refer, turn over; to banish
(E.g. Your way of life is sinful and wrong," he said fiercely.
Thus says a man who admits to worshipping a God who vilifies pleasure, relegates women to roles that are little more
than servants and broodmares, though they are the backbone of your church, and seeks to control his worshippers
through guilt and fear.
(P.C. Cast)

22


264.

incorrigible

(adj.) unreformable, hopelessly bad; deep-seated
E.g. It gives me great pleasure indeed to see the stubbornness of an incorrigible nonconformist warmly acclaimed.
(Albert Einstein)

265.

abstruse

(adj.) complicated, obscure
E.g. My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram, or the
most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. But I abhor the dull routine of existence. I crave for
mental exaltation.
(Arthur Conan Doyle)

266.

incite

(v.) provoke, inflame, stimulate
E.g. Manic-depression distorts moods and thoughts, incites dreadful behaviors, destroys the basis of rational thought,
and too often erodes the desire and will to live. It is an illness that is biological in its origins, yet one that feels
psychological in the experience of it, an illness that is unique in conferring advantage and pleasure, yet one that brings
in its wake almost unendurable suffering and, not infrequently, suicide.
(Kay Redfield Jamison)

267.

garrulous

(adj.) talkative, chatty, loquacious; wordy, verbose
E.g. Men respect the silent; they despise the garrulous.
(Conn Iggulden)

268.

ingenuous

(adj.) innocent, naive, artless; honest
E.g. She, like everyone else in the world, needed other people in order to be happy. But other people were so difficult.
They reacted in unpredictable ways, they surrounded themselves with defensive walls, they behaved just as she did,
pretending they didn't care about anything. When someone more open to life appeared, they either rejected them
outright or made them suffer, consigning them to being inferior, ingenuous.
(Paulo Coelho)

269.

gratify

(v.) gladden
E.g. Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other.
(Mark Twain)

270.

belie

(v.) hide, be in contradiction with
(E.g. Her calm face belied the terror she was feeling.

271.

corroborate

(v.) reinforce, confirm to be true
E.g. All decisions in the criminal justice system must be determined by the physical and scientific evidence, and the
credible testimony corroborated by that evidence, not in response to public outcry.
(Robert P. McCulloch)

272.

indigent

(adj.) poor, impoverished, needy, destitute
E.g. I may be indigent in name, position, and in appearance, but in my own mind I am an unrivaled goddess.
(Muriel Barbery)

273.

indolence

(adj.) laziness
E.g. We mistook violence for passion, indolence for leisure, and thought recklessness was freedom."
(Toni Morrison)

274.

underscore

(v.) underline; emphasize
E.g. Bonhoeffer's experiences with African American community underscored an idea that was developing in his mind:
the only real piety and power that he had seen in the American church seemed to be in the churches where there were
a present reality and a past history of suffering.
(Eric Metaxas)

275.

verbose

(adj) wordy
E.g. I notice that you use plain, simple language, short words and brief sentences. That is the way to write English―it
is the modern way and the best way. Stick to it; don't let fluff and flowers and verbosity creep in. When you catch an
adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them―then the rest will be valuable. They weaken when they
are close together. They give strength when they are wide apart. An adjective habit, or a wordy, diffuse, flowery habit,
once fastened upon a person, is as hard to get rid of as any other vice.
(Mark Twain)

276.

idiosyncrasy

(n.) odd details
E.g. Books have their idiosyncrasies as well as people, and will not show me their full beauties unless the place and
time in which they are read suits them.
(Elizabeth von Arnim)

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277.

extol

(v.) praise, laud, exalt
(E.g. Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled, but some people's idea of it
is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone else says anything back, that is an outrage.
( Winston S. Churchill)

278.

levity

(n.) silliness; light
(E.g. Moderate strength is shown in violence, supreme strength is shown in levity.
(G.K. Chesterton)

279.

exonerate

(v.) acquit, absolve, clear of blame, declare innocent
E.g. Forgiveness is not a matter of exonerating people who have hurt you. They may not deserve exoneration.
Forgiveness means cleansing your soul of the bitterness of 'what might have been,' 'what should have been,' and
'what didn't have to happen.' Someone has defined forgiveness as 'giving up all hope of having had a better past.'
What's past is past and there is little to be gained by dwelling on it. There are perhaps no sadder people then the men
and women who have a grievance against the world because of something that happened years ago and have let that
memory sour their view of life ever since.
(Harold S. Kushner)

280.

glutton

(n.) over-eater
E.g. He who distinguishes the true savor of his food can never be a glutton; he who does not cannot be otherwise.
(Henry David Thoreau)

281.

deride

(v.) mock, ridicule, sneer
E.g. People who pride themselves on their "complexity" and deride others for being "simplistic" should realize that the
truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth.
(Thomas Sowell)

282.

abstemious

(adj.) moderate, not indulgent
E.g. I was too prissy, too refined, too abstemious, too French to be a good American writer.
(Edmund White)

283.

profanity

(n.) crudeness, vulgarity; obscenity
E.g. There are in life a few moments so beautiful, that even words are a sort of profanity.
(Diana Palmer)

284.

disparagement

(n.) degradation, scorn, slander, belittlement
(E.g. For it is said that humans are never satisfied, that you give them one thing and they want something more. And
this is said in disparagement, whereas it is one of the greatest talents the species has and one that has made it
superior to animals that are satisfied with what they have.
(John Steinbeck)

285.

frugality

(n.) quality of being economical, thrift; meanness, stinginess
E.g. Even Socrates, who lived a very frugal and simple life, loved to go to the market. When his students asked
about this, he replied, "I love to go and see all the things I am happy without.
(Jack Kornfield)

286.

saturate

(v.) to soak thoroughly, fill to capacity
(E.g. The last introvert in a world of extroverts. Silence: my response to both emptiness and saturation. But silence
frightens people. I had to learn how to talk. Out of politeness.
(Ariel Gore)

287.

abridge

(v.) shorten, condense
E.g. Reading is one of the true pleasures of life. In our age of mass culture, when so much that we encounter is
abridged, adapted, adulterated, shredded, and boiled down, it is mind-easing and mind-inspiring to sit down privately
with a congenial book.
(Thomas S. Monson)

288.

braggart

(n.) arrogant boaster
E.g. The greatest braggarts are usually the biggest cowards.

(Jean Jacques Rousseau)

289.

indict

(v.) accuse, charge, criticize
E.g. Nothing indicts female allegiance to patriarchy more than the willingness to behave as though the problems
created by cultural investment in sexist thinking about the nature of male and female roles can be solved by women's
working harder.
(Bell Hooks)

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